"I was only looking for the rest room," the child argued, "I don't see…"
"The rest room is there, beside the dining room, not a block down the hall in the private wing. That area of the building is reserved for the very sickest patients, and they must not be disturbed."
"But-"
"You'll remain here in the social room as you were told, or you cannot come back to Casa Capri. You will not disturb the residents." The thin woman dropped Dillon's arm, stood staring down at her as if to make her point, then turned away. Dillon's face was red, her scowl fierce.
Across the room a man in a wheelchair watched the little exchange with interest, and as Dillon sat down on the couch across from Eula, he headed in their direction.
Though he was wheelchair-bound, he seemed too young to be living here among the elderly. Joe thought he couldn't be out of his late twenties-though Joe admitted he was no authority on human age. The man's smooth, white face was lean, his blue eyes friendly, but his body was puffy from inactivity. The roll of fat around his middle, beneath his white cotton shirt, looked like a soft white inner tube. Wheeling his chair toward them, he swerved around couches and chairs with a flashy disregard for the occupants. Coming to rest beside Mae Rose, he gave his" chair a final twist like a young man spinning his sports car, and parked beside her chair. He looked Dillon over with curiosity, winked conspiratorially at Eula, then leaned toward Mae, looking hard at the tabby cat in her lap. Dulcie looked back at him warily.
"What's that, Ms. Rose, a fur neckpiece? Did someone drop a moth-eaten fur piece in your lap?"
Eula Weems giggled.
Mae Rose's painted cheeks flamed brighter, and she petted Dulcie with quick, nervous strokes. Dulcie didn't move; she lay stretched out across the pink afghan coolly regarding the young man, and definitely not looking moth-eaten-her dark stripes gleamed like silk. She was very still, and nothing about her seemed to change except that her green eyes had widened; only Joe saw her stiffen imperceptibly, as if to strike.
Eula smiled coquettishly, stroking Joe. "Look, Teddy. I have an old fur piece, too."
Teddy laughed. "Or is that one of those moldering gray union suits you tell about on the farm, that your mama sewed you into?"
Eula favored him with a girlish guffaw.
Teddy said, "Mae, you're hugging that cat like it was a baby. Or like one of your little dolls."
"Leave me alone, Teddy. I shouldn't wonder if it was you that drove Jane Hubble away."
The young man's eyes filled with amazement. His smile was sunny and very kind; he looked as if Mae Rose could not help her aberrations.
But Dillon, watching them, was suddenly all attention. Gripped by some inner storm, Dillon raised her eyes in a quick, flickering glance at Mae Rose and the pale young man; then she looked down again.
Eula said, "Everyone knows Jane Hubble's right over there in Nursing." She looked to Teddy expectantly.
"Of course she is," Teddy said kindly. "They can't let us visit them, Mae. It's too hard on sick people to have us underfoot going in and out, getting in the way. Of course she's there. Where else would she be? Ask Adelina." He put his arm around Mae. "I know you miss her. Maybe when she's better, something can be arranged."
Dillon had turned away, seemed to have lost interest in the conversation. She was all fidgets, moving restlessly, and when she settled on the arm of Eula's chair and leaned down to pet Joe, her fingers were rigid, tense; she was filled with hidden excitement-or apprehension.
"She could send word," Mae said. "The nurses could at least bring a message."
"She's too sick," Eula said. "So sick she has tubes in her arms. They wanted to send me over there with the blood pressure, but I wouldn't have it. I won't have all those tubes stuck in me."
Mae Rose's wrinkled face collapsed into a hurt mask. "I'd only stay a minute."
"The doors are locked," Eula said. "That's all I know. That's all there is to know."
Mae Rose said nothing more, sat quietly stroking Dulcie.
"If she's sick…" Dillon began, "if this Jane Hubble is sick…"
Teddy turned to look at her.
Mae Rose burst into tears, covering her face with her hands. Dulcie sat up and touched a paw to the old lady's cheek as the little woman huddled, sobbing.
"How long since you've seen her?" Dillon said to Mae, ignoring Mae's tears. "How long since you've seen your friend Jane?"
"Mae doesn't remember," Eula said. "She gets mixed up-in this place all the days run together. She knows Jane's all right; she just likes to make a scene."
But when Mae Rose finished crying and blew her nose, she fixed Eula with an accusing stare. "Your own husband went over to see her. He tried to see her. He was angry, too, when they wouldn't let him in."
"I told Frederick, don't you go over there." Eula's fat fingers pressed irritably along Joe's back. "I told him, you're not to go over there alone to see that woman."
Dillon looked at Eula uncertainly. "You didn't want your husband to see Jane? But…?" She looked blank, then looked shocked suddenly. Then fought to keep from laughing. "You didn't want your husband…" She swallowed, then began again. "Does your husband- does he live here, too?"
"Lives over in Cottages," Eula said. "You can have your own car, very stuck-up. Then if you get sick you come over here. Frederick says he can't stand it over here, says it's depressing. If you get real bad sick, like Jane with a stroke, then you go into Nursing. I don't know what Frederick does over there in that cottage all day. He says he goes into the village on the bus, to the library. I don't know what he does. I don't know what goes on over there with those women."
Dillon rose and turned away, smothering a laugh.
But after a moment she turned back, gave Mae Rose a little smile. "You must miss your friend. I had a friend once who went away."
"Her room was next to mine," Mae said. "The corner room, the one they use now for visiting. When Jane… When they moved her to Nursing," Mae said doubtfully, "they closed that room, and now they use it for visiting."
"Which corner room?" Dillon asked.
"The one behind the parlor right next to my room." Mae pointed vaguely out through the glass doors toward the far side of the patio.
Dillon walked over and peered out. Turning back, she said thoughtfully, "I don't understand. You mean visitors stay overnight?"
"They-" Mae began.
"No," Eula said irritably. "No one comes overnight. But if you're in bed all the time-bedridden-and you have a dinky little room, you have your visitors there in the big room, it makes a better impression. Those corner rooms are the biggest, private bath and all. If you have a little poky room, or if you're in Nursing, they move you into the corner room to entertain company. Your relatives come, it looks grand. They figure you're getting a good deal for what they pay.
"But when they're gone again, it's back to your own dinky room, and they shut the big room. It's all for looks. Everything for looks." Eula yawned and settled deeper into her chair, shaking Joe. He rose, turned around several times against her fat stomach. Teddy left them, spinning his chair around and wheeling away. From the kitchen Joe could hear a clatter of pots and then a nurse came out, rolling a squeaky metal cart with a cloth draped over.
"Meals for the Nursing wing," Eula said. "Not many of 'em can eat solid food. They get fed early, then get their medicine and are put to sleep."
Joe shivered.
Dillon watched the white-uniformed nurse push the cart away toward the admitting desk. And, ducking her head, pretending to scratch her arm, she kept glancing out the patio doors.
But not until Eula loosed her grip on Joe and began to snore, did Dillon pick Joe up in her arms and head for the patio. His last glimpse of Eula Weems, she had her mouth open, huffing softly.
Pushing open the glass slider, Dillon slipped out into the walled garden, into patches of sun and ragged shade. Joe sniffed gratefully the good fresh air.